Cruel to the End
by payroo
Summary: Alim Surana rejects Morrigan's offer and goes to Zevran for the last time seeking... reassurance? comfort? lies? After the final battle, Zevran tries to lose himself. Yet another angsty Zevran/m!Surana Ultimate Sacrifice drabbly thing.
1. Before the Storm

He had left with Alistair and that other Grey Warden they had rescued in Fort Drakon. Warden business, he had explained apologetically, leaving Zevran with an empty and cold bed the night before the battle.

Zevran paces his admittedly comfortable quarters within Arl Eamon's estate. As an assassin, he had developed a sort of sixth sense for trouble, and this sense had been tingling since Riordan had led the two younger Grey Wardens up the stairs. There had been something in the older Warden's tired gaze, something sad. Whatever business they had, it could not be good.

He has just about given up waiting and is sitting dejectedly on his bed when a tentative knock sounds on the door. It's him, of course.

There is death in his eyes. He is so small, so fragile.

"You call?" Zevran places a hand on his lover's cheek. The Warden leans into his touch ever so slightly, eyes avoiding Zevran's face.

"We need to talk."

Gently, he pushes Zevran's hand aside, but keeps a tight grasp on his fingers.

"I probably won't survive tomorrow."

Zevran laughs, lifting Alim's fingers to his lips and kissing them gently. Alim closes his eyes and exhales every so slightly. "Since when is that news for any of us? Battling darkspawn isn't exactly picking daisies. But we've managed so far. Why should tomorrow be different?"

"Riordan told us the truth about why only Grey Wardens can end the Blight. When the archdemon dies, it normally seeks out a darkspawn to plant its essence in and is reborn again. But a Grey Warden carries the taint…"

His grip on Zevran's fingers is almost painfully tight now.

"And so the archdemon's soul goes into the Warden's body, destroying both in the process."

Zevran cannot speak.

"Morrigan…" the Warden squeezes his eyes shut. "Morrigan knew of this, and had a way out. But it was blood magic, and would create a baby with the soul of an Old God, a monster perhaps far worse than the Blight. So I rejected her."

"Why are you telling me this?" Zevran, strangely enough, feels anger. "You came here for a final night of passion or something? Use me up while you still can?" He turns away, thrusting away the other man's hands. His teeth are clenched. He welcomes the anger, welcomes how the angry red in his chest drowns out his other feelings, for he know he will drown if he lets them rise.

To his horror he sees tears welling up in the Warden's hazel-green eyes.

"I'm scared," he whispers. It's almost a whimper. "I don't want to die."

Much too quickly, the anger dies away, leaving only a cold tightness in the pit of his stomach. It's terrifying to watch him cry, this man whose amassed army even now marches in unprecedented number and alliance, who has always been the leader, always holding them together. Now he needs to be held, and Zevran is only watching numbly, hands suspended in the air.

"You're not the only Grey Warden," Zevran desperately tries to think of something, anything, a way out of this. "There's Alistair, and Riordan—"

The mage wipes away his tears hastily, shaking his head. "Alistair must be king. Everything we've done will be for naught if he falls. And we must not count on Riordan. I need to be prepared." He straightens himself, attempting to regain composure. "I'm sorry for burdening you with this. There's nothing you can do anyhow. I should go."

As he turns in a tight little motion to the door, Zevran catches his hand. "You owe me a final night of passion." His attempted joke is distasteful, and it's obvious the Warden thinks so too, but he allows himself to be carried to the bed.

Zevran's hands tremble as he strips away the mage's robes. All he can think is that this may be the last time he can do so, the last time he can kiss these lean shoulders, this white neck with its gently fluttering pulse, these delicate collarbones. He is altogether too rough, too fierce, too clumsy, as if this were his first time from so many years ago. His art is absent; he thrusts with a mindless desperation as the mage gasps. It's terrible and pathetic but he wants to feel him warm and tight and so _alive _he never wants it to end.

But it does.

When he awakes in the morning, the Warden is still in his arms. His face is motionless, as if he is—

The cold fist clenches around Zevran's innards again, and he rouses him with a kiss.

When he chooses for him to go with him to battle the archdemon, Zevran says something ridiculous about storming the gates of the Dark City. He regrets it almost as soon as the words leave his mouth, but the Warden smiles. It's the saddest smile he's ever seen. He feels places breaking that he didn't even know were inside him.

And when they see Riordan fall, Zevran feels his world collapse. He barely sees the endless waves of darkspawn he cuts down in their way to the rooftop. He almost wants to stop so that they can't get there, can't face the archdemon and—

But of course they prevail, and soon enough the Warden stands panting before the fatally wounded dragon, watching as it flails its mighty head in struggle. There is a sword by his side, but he hesitates to grab it. He turns to look at Zevran, eyes pleading.

"Zevran, I don't think I can do this," he whispers, for his ears alone.

He throws his blades aside to catch him in one final embrace, burying his face into the other elf's loose red hair, if only so he does not have to look into those eyes as he sends him off to die.

"Be brave, my love," he says against his mouth, and kisses him, slowly, sweetly. There's a strange wet saltiness on the tip of his tongue. He realizes he is crying.

He allows himself to be pushed away, gently. He cannot watch as his love runs the sword through the belly of the archdemon, as he is engulfed in light and finally collapses on the floor.

When it is finished, he pushes past the speechless Alistair and collects the body, already growing cold.

((Author's Note: Yet another Zevran-based Ultimate Sacrifice fic! This one has been sitting on my hard drive for months and I was getting sick of seeing it in my WIP folder. This will probably be the last Zev US fic from me. Whew!))

((Call for technical help: Are other people seeing this as all centered? It's showing up normally left-aligned in the document and in the live preview, but I have no idea why it decided to center everything once I upload it))


	2. After the Storm

He stands there decked in noble's clothing, in front of so many luminaries and dignitaries and other assorted important types. He, along with the rest of their party, is in the position of honor.

They are close enough to see his still face.

Alistair, _King _Alistair, is speaking, but Zevran doesn't take in a word. He just stares at his dead lover's lips, closed and unmoving. It feels fundamentally wrong to see him like this.

"Some of us were friends, companions… some of us even loved him." Ironic that these are the words he tunes in for. Alistair's eyes flicker over his own.

Everyone present follows the king's lead to turn their heads to stare at him. He doesn't even have the energy to lift his head proudly and stare them down. He can only fix his gaze on Alim's closed eyes, as if staring hard enough would open them again.

But he's an assassin, and he's known enough death to abandon such idle fantasies.

Alistair continues his speech, voice hollow and empty to Zevran's ears. Finally he stops speaking and looks expectantly at Zevran.

What does he expect? That he will passionately run to the side of the stone his heart now lies on, weeping and tearing his hair? He almost decides to do just that, but he can't muster the strength to move. His eyes are dry and he cannot point them away from that they desire most.

_Do you look at everyone like that? _he had asked him, once, so long ago.

His breath catches in his throat and he finally manages to close his eyes, just as Alistair glares at him and gestures for the honor guards to bear that cold slab of marble to where the mourners can individually pass by to gawk at their hero's body.

As the funeral guests file into line, Zevran pointedly studies his fingernails. Wynne touches his shoulder, briefly, and he refuses to look up. He makes some sort of grunt in response to whatever she is saying to him, and she thankfully leaves. Sten knows to keep his distance, and Oghren is too busy bawling behind a barrel, perhaps sober, perhaps not.

Leliana slowly and cautiously approaches him, and he turns to face the other way, still staring at his hands. "Zevran," she touches his forearm, and he retracts it. "You've not spoken a word since… since then. This… this isn't healthy."

"Oh really," he snarls at her, and she visibly flinches. He relentlessly continues his assault, however. "That's funny, I had no idea. Take your pity and shove it up your—"

Her eyes well with tears, and she beats a hasty retreat. "I'm sorry. You're not the only one who feels his loss, though. I'll, I'll leave now if that's what you want."

"Good. Stay gone," he snaps, and storms away, anywhere to avoid having to see people who weren't worthy to lick the dirt off of Alim's boots queue up and prod at his dead body. Of course, he is soon accosted by Alistair.

"You're not even going to pay your last respects, are you?" the king asks, tone frigid. "I thought he meant something to you."

"I said my goodbyes before he killed the archdemon. This was while you were standing a good fifty paces away, so perhaps you don't remember." He is being unfair and he knows it, but he can't stop the bitter acid from welling up and stinging everything in its path.

"Shut up," Alistair hisses, and Zevran steels himself for a physical attack. It never comes. Alistair's eyes burn with more than just tears, and his clenched fists shake slightly at his sides. "He will be taken to Weisshaupt at sundown today. Do whatever you feel you owe him before then, as this is your last chance," he says as he stalks away.

As much as he hates to admit it, Alistair is right, and he appends himself to the back of the line snaking in front of that high marble slab. When he is finally the last one there, he bends down and kisses him on the lips.

He is cold and stiff and already tastes like death, but Zevran deepens the kiss, his dry eyes finally issuing forth saline droplets onto Alim's cool pale skin. His fingers desperately entwine themselves in his soft red hair, stroke that spot on his neck that always made him gasp and flush, that area on his collarbone that drove him mad.

But it is a corpse he is embracing, and the corpse merely slides back down to its final resting place when Zevran releases him.

The sun has already set, and Zevran sinks to the dark ground as the guards bear his heart away.

He curses him for even telling him about Morrigan's intentions. But of course he was too good, too pure, too noble and too self-sacrificing to take a deal with the devil, even for Zevran's sake. Always accepting, always bowing his head to the greater good. The greater good that now sees his lifeless form borne away on a white marble block.

The next few days are a haze to Zevran, and he remembers little of the many taverns he drinks himself to oblivion in, the many anonymous bodies he embraces.

He lies naked on the floor of a room in the Pearl, his purchased company for the night coiled about him, spent and sleeping. He leans back and studies the prostitute's face with now-sober eyes. An elven man, with red hair and fine features. A fine choice his drunken self had made.

He pushes him off and stands on shaky legs. The whore looks up at him with sultry eyes.

"I would have done that for free, you know," he grins. "Not every night you get to bed one of the heroes of Ferelden."

For a brief, terrifying moment Zevran seriously considers slitting his throat, cutting that white skin open and watching the blood, so red, spill out-

He gathers his things and leaves without a word.

Leliana is in the waiting room, and despite himself Zevran notices the dark hollows under her eyes, the new sharpness in her cheekbones.

"Zevran," she chokes. "Please don't do this to yourself. It's not what he would have wanted."

She had loved him too, but he had gently rejected her advances, had chosen him instead. For all the that amounted to.

There are so many things he can say to break her now, to reduce her to a puddle of tears, but Zevran doesn't have the energy to be hateful or angry or even sad. He just feels empty.

It's raining outside, like it does so often in Ferelden. Both he and Alim had been unused to the rain, Zevran accustomed to the dry heat of Antiva and Alim raised largely indoors. He can see him even now, smiling through the rainwater running down his face, soaking through his flimsy robes-

Maker, even the weather reminded him of him. He was truly going to go mad at this rate.

"I'll leave Ferelden," he says, more to himself than Leliana, though she snaps up her head in surprise. "I'll go back to Antiva."

"What are you going to do?" she asks, and he half-wonders if she's already penning her great ballad, writing the verse for the fate of the great fallen hero's bereaved lover.

He shrugs, clips his daggers into their proper places at his belt. "Kill everyone who's ever crossed me. Starting with the Crows."

He expects, almost wants her to protest, to try and turn him toward the light as _he_ had so often done. But she just sighs and stands to leave.

"Maker be with you then, Zevran."

"May he be with us all," he replies, bitterness so thick it threatens to choke him.

Halfway to Antiva, he hears that one of the Hero of Ferelden's companions has composed a ballad in her fallen leader's honor, that the bard in question disappeared shortly after a single breathtaking performance.

He wonders if she mentioned him at all. To his surprise, he hopes that she did. He wants that Zevran, the one who was reborn the day Alim spared him and died the day Alim did, to live on in _someone's_ memory, just to prove it wasn't all a dream that ended a month ago.

He continues to Antiva, ready to kill and be killed.


End file.
